Leading Questions
by Lanie L Sullivan
Summary: A brief look at what happens when Dotty attempts to visit Amanda at IFF and finds Lee instead. Set mid-season 4. One-shot. Complete.


**Disclaimer:** "Scarecrow and Mrs. King" is copyrighted to Warner Brothers and Shoot the Moon Productions. The plot is mine, but not the characters. This story is meant for enjoyment purposes only. No infringement is intended.

 **Author's Note:** A little note to explain the timeline of this fic. Since Phillip initially met Lee in "Any Number Can Play," yet "Santa's Got a Brand New Bag," had Lee spending Christmas with the whole family, we can safely assume that these two episodes were aired out of order. With that in mind, this story will be set after "Number," but before "Santa."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Billy and Lee were just about to exit the elevator that led to the foyer when Lee was startled by hearing his future mother-in-law's voice saying to Mrs. Marston, "I'm looking for Amanda King."

"Shit," Lee hissed as he hastily held Billy back from exiting and then slipped out himself quickly closing the closet door behind him before Dotty had a chance to turn her head and spot a man she knew was Agency.

"I'm sorry," Mrs. Marston replied, peering over her glasses at the other woman disdainfully, "but Mrs. King is in a meeting at the moment and can't be disturbed."

"Oh, well, that's disappointing," Dotty said. "I was in the neighborhood doing some shopping and I was hoping that I could take her to lunch. I'm her mother. You know, it's funny in all the time she's worked here I never have seen where she works or-"

"Mrs. West," Lee greeted her as he stepped up the matron's desk, feeling the need to stop her Amanda-like ramble before Mrs. Marston fixed her with one of her patented icy glares. He'd only met Dotty a couple of times, but he knew that Amanda came by her rambling honestly and while Mrs. Marston had come to acquire some patience regarding Amanda in that sense, he doubted she'd give Dotty that same courtesy.

"My goodness, Mr. Stetson, where did you come from?" Dotty looked around the room, but couldn't fathom where he could have been that she hadn't seen him. After all, he'd come from the opposite direction as the front door and she'd have seen him if he'd come down the stairs behind the desk occupied by the somewhat unpleasant woman currently staring her down.

Lee just smiled and to avoid answering her question, he turned his attention to The Agency's resident watchdog and suggested, "Mrs. Marston, Why don't we get Mrs. West a visitor's pass and I'll show her the Film Library where Amanda and I work and keep her occupied until Amanda gets out of her meeting, huh?" He gave the older woman a pleading look and gestured up the stairs.

"Whatever you say, Mr. Stetson," the matron responded coolly as she reached into her drawer and handed a guest pass to Dotty, rolling her eyes all the while.

"That sounds very exciting. I must say I have always been wildly curious about just what it is you two spend so much time doing here," Dotty gushed.

Lee reached for Dotty's arm and guided her toward the stairs, "If you'll just come with me, I'll show you where we work, but I'm afraid you may be a bit disappointed. It's not really all that exciting. A lot of time spent in the editing room."

"So, my daughter tells me," Dotty replied disbelievingly as she sneaked a glance at the incredibly handsome man beside her. "I have to wonder sometimes if she isn't stretching the truth just a bit. I mean, honestly, the way she talks it's as if you spend more time in the editing room than you do filming."

"Oh, well, you remember when we met a while back, you did mention all the out-of-town trips we take," Lee quickly jumped in, sensing that it was going to be a much longer conversation if he didn't.

"Yes, I did." She eyed him skeptically as they reached the landing.

Lee flinched slightly at her persistent gaze, but then shrugged, reached for the door to open it for her and responded, what he hoped was nonchalantly, "Well, that's where all our filming gets done. You know, doing government documentaries only in DC would get dull after a while. Plus, there are some times that we edit things others have filmed."

"Oh, I don't know. This is a lot of history in the city. I'm sure there are a ton of topics you could cover." She wasn't quite ready to let him off the hook that easily. She knew...she just _knew_ there were things about her daughter's life she didn't know that this man with whom she spent a large chunk of her time did know. She was determined to find out.

"Sure, but how many times can you do a documentary on the history of the Capitol building or the Washington monument?" He indicated the door to their office as he reached into his pocket for his keys. "Here, we are..." He unlocked the door and added, "Ladies first." He desperately hoped that he sounded cooler than he felt.

"I suppose that could be true," Dotty admitted grudgingly as they entered the Q Bureau and Lee closed the door behind them. "I just wondered if there weren't some other reason for all these trips...the ones over a whole weekend, perhaps?"

"What other reason would there be?" Lee asked nervously. _Cool it,_ he scolded himself.

"Well, you two are seeing each other, aren't you?" she countered bluntly.

"Um...yeah...I guess you could say that." _Not possible,_ he mentally added to his earlier thought. He rounded his desk to put some distance between himself and the worst interrogator he'd ever faced. That was when he spotted the coffee pot. He breathed a sigh of relief that he'd just made a fresh pot of coffee before his briefing with Billy. At this point though, he'd be happy for anything that would offer a distraction from Dotty West's penetrating gaze. "Mrs. West, would you like some coffee?"

"That would be lovely. Thank you, Mr. Stetson."

Letting out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, he busied himself pouring two cups of coffee. "Cream and sugar, right?" he inquired, though he knew the answer. He'd lurked outside Amanda's house enough to know practically everything about Dotty, even what kind of bubble bath she favored.

"That's right. And you take just cream in yours?"

"Mm-hmm," Lee mumbled in response. He took a quick glance at his watch and let out a deep sigh. It would still be another half-hour or so before Amanda would get out of class. What was he going to do until then? He couldn't exactly give a civilian the fifty-cent tour. "Here we go," he said more cheerily than he felt as he turned back toward her and handed her a cup.

"Though I did wonder how Amanda knew that." She gave him a pointed look.

He shrugged again and took a sip of his coffee. "You know, it's like she said...just from work. We have worked pretty closely together for over thr-" He caught himself quickly when he remembered that as far as Dotty knew, Amanda had started working with him a year later than she actually had. "Er... over two years. She knows that about me, just like I know she only takes sugar in hers. We've had a couple of little spats over that when our cups have gotten mixed up, believe me." He chuckled awkwardly as he remembered a certain early morning when they had both been half-awake and reached for the wrong cups.

"That must be it then." Dotty replied, but she wasn't entirely convinced of that. She gave him a sideways look and added, "Though I do have to wonder how that can be when your cup has your name on it."

"W-what?" he stammered.

Dotty nodded to the cup in his left hand. "Your coffee cup. It has your name on it. It's quite distinctive, so I don't see how you could get them mixed up, I mean with your name on it and all. Besides, even if it didn't have your name on it, I'm sure if she knows you well enough to know how to take your coffee, she'd surely know which cup is yours. Like at home, we must have a dozen coffee cups in the cupboards, but Amanda and I always have the habit of drinking out of the same ones."

"Well, I just meant..." _Crap! What do I mean?_

As if echoing his thoughts, Dotty probed, "What _did_ you mean?"

"I meant...um..." How was it that he could think so quickly in the field when undercover, but was a blank slate when it came to this woman? "The trips!" he blurted out as a thought finally struck him. "You know, all the trips we take out of town. I mean, it's not like I'm so stuck on this cup that I have to take it with me when I travel. We've spent a lot of time in restaurants during our film shoots." He walked back around and sat behind his desk feeling the need to get away.

 _Nice dodge,_ she thought. _But not quite nice enough._ "But yet, you just started dating?"

He tried to remember if that was what Amanda had told her. "Um...did Amanda tell you that?"

"Well, naturally, I just assumed since last week was the first time you've ever come to the door to pick her up for a date." She paused for a moment and then sat in the chair opposite him as she continued to stare at him. "Unless, perhaps, there's something I don't know."

"No, no, no. No, there isn't," he hastily answered.

"Hmmm..." She took a sip of her coffee as she pondered her next move. "You know...I have to say that sounds strange to me."

"S-s-strange?" he choked out. "Wh-what sounds strange?"

"Well, the two of you seem awfully close for two people who just started seeing one another and there have been all those overnight trips together..."

"Work trips," he reminded her.

"Oh, yes. Of course. Silly me. Always working you two. I would think that working for the government, you'd have some vacation time built up that you could have taken by now. I mean, Amanda hasn't taken one since that trip she won...unless of course you count that impromptu thing where they two of you ran off together."

"Well, that wasn't exactly a vacation, you know," he responded defensively. "If you recall, we had federal agents after us. They were even swarming your house."

"Oh, yes, I remember all too well. Still, I'm curious..."

 _Here it comes._ Lee cringed, but asked anyway, "Curious? About what?"

"If what you've both told me is true and you just starting seeing each other, what on earth would possess her to run off with you? It's so unlike her to not even think about what that might do to her children."

"No, no, no. You've got it all wrong. She was thinking of her children...and you for that matter, when she took off. She was thinking of protecting all of you. We were in a really tight spot and not only were the agents after us, but so were the criminals who set us up to look like traitors in the first place. They could have used you to try to get to her. She knew that if she stayed there, she'd be arrested and the Agency would be done, but if she left, there would be agents all over the house so those guys wouldn't dare to try to hurt you."

"But why would criminals want to set you up in the first place?" Her eyes widened at the thoughts swirling around in her head. "I mean, why two innocuous film people?"

 _Plain old simple revenge,_ he thought, but gave a shrug and answered, "I'm sure Amanda told you. They-"

"No, she didn't," Dotty interrupted.

Lee sighed and continued, "Basically, they needed a patsy to take suspicion off themselves. We were easy targets because we work for the government.

Dotty nodded. "You know, you almost sound like one of them yourself."

"A criminal? No. I was cleared of all those charges the same time Amanda was."

"No, I meant an agent. The way you talk, I swear you could be one of them."

"I just meant...I was just trying to explain what happened...what I can, I mean. Most of it is..."

"Classified," she finished for him. "I know. Amanda told me, but I'm not just talking about now. You were the same way when you were talking about Harry's trouble...you and Amanda both."

"Well, with the kind of films we make, we do sometimes talk to law enforcement..." he countered. "We've done some training films for the FBI and such."

"Well, if all of them are as rude as that Mr. Melrose, I don't know how you stand it. Hmm...you know they searched our house, right? Treated us like common criminals."

Lee nodded. "Yeah, I know and I'm sorry about that. If there was any other-"

Dotty held up her hand to silence him. "No apology necessary. It's water under the bridge."

"Thank you," Lee replied cordially, but warily. He had a feeling that she wasn't close to being done. He took another sip of his coffee and braced himself.

"But it left me with a lot of questions. For example, why did they find birth control pills in Amanda's bathroom when she hasn't been in a serious relationship in years? I could only assume at the time she started taking them again because of you..."

Lee choked on his mouthful of coffee, spurting it across the desk.

"...but you claim that you just started dating. Are you okay, Mr. Stetson?"

"It's Lee," he reminded her as he jumped out of his seat, turned his back on her and began looking for something to clean up the mess with.

"Of course...Lee. Can I help you find something?" She stood and walked over the front of Amanda's desk.

"No...thank you." The last thing he needed was for her to start looking too closely at the office. He was just glad Amanda has cleaned his desk off early this morning so there were no case files laying around like normal. He knew that with her having Billy's card, she would instantly recognize the Agency's logo and have more questions. He walked over to Amanda's desk and began rifling through the drawers. "Amanda always keeps extra napkins in her desk for things like this." He returned to his task and rose with a triumphant, "A-ha!" He quickly closed the drawers he'd opened to avoid the risk of Dotty seeing Amanda's Agency training books inside and walked back over to his own desk.

"So, this is her desk?" Dotty questioned. She looked at it more closely. "I should have know with the fresh flowers." She lightly fingered one of the blooms.

Lee nodded. "Yeah, she loves them."

"Oh, I know she does. She takes great care of the flower garden at home...with my help, of course. But you know, for several years now, the ones under the kitchen window just won't grow like they used to."

"Hmm... that's strange," Lee mumbled noncommittally while Dotty walked behind Amanda's desk.

"Yes, it really is." Dotty smiled as she saw that her daughter's desk was also adorned with pictures of the boys. "I remember when this picture was taken," she said fondly. "The boys are growing up so fast." She turned and glanced behind the desk and pointed at the plaque hanging there. "What's this?"

"Hmm...?" Lee looked up from his desk and tossed a wad of paper napkins in the wastebasket.

"This award...for Amanda...Service above and beyond the call of duty."

"Oh...that...Well...Amanda, you know she's very dedicated to her job. She earned that."

"Well, that's wonderful that she was recognized for all her hard work, but I wonder why she wouldn't have shared something like that with me."

"Oh, you know how she is about keeping her work life separate from her home life." He knew it sounded lame, but he couldn't exactly tell her the truth. He lightly reached for her arm and steered her back toward the chair she'd vacated before she could get any more curious. "Why don't we just sit back down, huh?"

Dotty complied, but then as soon as Lee sat down, continued her earlier thought. "I do know she's awfully secretive about what it is she does here. I suppose that's why she didn't tell me about you for so long."

"Nothing to tell, really," he insisted.

"Come on, level with me. How long has this love affair between the two of you been going on?"

"Mrs. West..."

"Dotty, please."

"Okay, Dotty it is." He smiled a bit at that, but couldn't help feeling that he was just a helpless fly caught in a spider's web and Dotty was a black widow. "And, really, Amanda and I...we...we were just friends for a long time." At least that part was true...or partially true anyway. He'd been in love with her for longer than he cared to admit, but he'd been too dense to tell her. "As for the work stuff, I'm sure Amanda's told you that since we work for the government, she can't share a lot of what we do."

Dotty sighed. "Oh, I know. I just sometimes wish you didn't have to do so much of it. It's like I said earlier, she hasn't taken a vacation in at least two years. Unless, of course, one of these trips she says she's taken for work was actually a vacation that she just didn't want to tell me about."

Lee swallowed hard as he reflected on the vacation he and Amanda had recently taken to Pine Top. _Please, don't ask about that,_ he pleaded with her in his head. "You know, come to think of it, I could use a vacation myself right about now," he muttered glibly.

"So, it's not just Amanda who hasn't taken one recently?"

"Nope, not just Amanda," he assured her as he held on tightly to his coffee cup as if it were a lifeline. It gave his something to do besides just sweat under her intense scrutiny.

"I suppose it's enough for Amanda that she gets to travel so much for work. She really does seem to enjoy those trips...like this one she took just last month...another weekend one, I might add. It was really rather strange because I expected her to come back completely exhausted because she'd just pulled an all-nighter here, and then without even having time to rest from that, she was off with you again on another filming job."

"Well, this job can be demanding," Lee interjected as he shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

"But the funny thing was, when she came back from that trip, she seemed more well-rested and happier than I've seen her since...well, since she took that fishing trip with Dean three years ago."

Lee snorted. "That guy! He was nowhere near good enough for her. Talk about dull. That guy was duller than dishwater."

Dotty eyed him suspiciously. "How do you know about Dean?"

"What?"

"I mean, I can't argue with you about him being dull, but how do you even know about him? He and Amanda broke up long before you two met."

"Oh...um...well, Amanda told me about him. I tell you, I never met the guy and I was bored stupid just hearing her talk about him."

"I see. Well, at least he was dependable."

"A golden retriever is dependable, but I wouldn't want to date one," Lee grumbled in irritation. The last thing he wanted to talk about was Amanda's weatherman ex-boyfriend.

Dotty laughed at Lee's joke. "I suppose that's true. Still, I'm getting off the subject here. I was just going to ask you about the all-nighter you two worked followed by yet another 'business' trip...you know, if you knew how Amanda came home from a work trip so relaxed it was as if she'd been on a vacation."

 _Shit!_ He'd been hoping that topic had been successfully avoided. He knew exactly the trip she meant. The same trip he'd been inwardly praying that she wouldn't ask about. He remembered it vividly, how he'd tried too hard to give her too many choices just to make her happy, how they'd stayed up all night trying to find the Kalahari list and how to reward them for their efforts, Billy had given them an extra day off that they'd taken full advantage of. He also remembered how they hadn't spent much time skiing on the slopes, but instead had spent the time exploring the slopes of each other. _Stop it, Stetson._ He knew those kinds of thoughts were sure to get him in trouble because they'd show on his face; something he was sure the astute woman across from him would instantly pick up on.

"It was...you know...just another work trip."

"Uh-huh." She set her cup down on the desk. She was beginning to get irritated with this man being as stubborn as her daughter about sharing a bit of their life together. "So, where'd you go? It must have been some place fabulous for her to have returned the way she did."

"You know, we travel so much that I really don't remember." He was lying his ass off and he felt a bit guilty in doing so since Dotty was going to be his mother-in-law, but what could he really tell her? They'd been lying to her for so long, there was no turning back now.

"Well, with Christmas coming up, maybe you can both take a little time off to enjoy the holidays. Amanda told me she invited you for dinner. It's going to be great! Joe will be there for the first time in years and my sister, Lillian...I know...I just _know_ that she would love to get to know you the way that I have today." She smirked at him and insisted, "You _are_ coming, aren't you?"

Her tone having indicated that it was more of an order than a question, stammered, "Um...well, I-I-I don't know. It all depends on the duty roster at the time. You know, around here we kinda rotate so it's fair to everyone." He had to remember to make sure Billy rotated him onto the duty roster. Amanda had told him about her aunt Lillian and how much like Dotty she was. He was faltering now just being alone in a room with Dotty. He surely couldn't handle two of them at once, especially since Dotty's tone when talking about her had made it seem he'd be facing another interrogation.

"Well, I do hope that you two don't get 'rotated' onto the duty roster. You work yourselves to death as it is." Her eyes widened as a disturbing thought struck her. "You don't think you'd be sent on another trip a Christmas time, do you?"

In dire need of a subject change, he decided to turn the tables on her. "What's with the twenty questions, anyway? I mean, Amanda and I have worked together successfully for a couple of years now and I always bring her home safe and sound."

Looking a tad affronted, Dotty responded coolly, "Is it a crime for me to want to get to know my daughter's new gentleman friend? I mean, what if this turns out to be something serious between you?"

"I...I mean, we..." He wanted so badly to tell her that it _was_ serious, that Amanda was the only woman for him, that he couldn't wait until she was his wife, but he knew he couldn't.

"Is it?" she prodded.

"Huh?" Lee looked stupefied.

"Serious...between you and Amanda?"

"Well, we...um...we've spent...you know...time together and over that time, we..." He was a complete loss for how to finish that sentence without giving away the lies they'd told. The old saw of "oh, what a tangled web we weave..." began running through his head. He'd never felt it to be more true until now. There were lies upon lies upon half-truths that had been told to Dotty over the years, there was no way that web could ever be untangled.

"You what?"

 _Damn her persistence._ If one positive thing came out of this whole ordeal, he could now see where Amanda got her tenacity in the field, one of the things that made her such a good agent. _Yes! Use that,_ he told himself. "I'm thinking..." he gave Dotty a broad grin. "I think I've finally figured out what makes Amanda so good at this job."

"Yes?" Dotty's brown eyes sparkled at the look of panic that had crossed Lee's face a moment ago. She knew she was getting to him.

"Her knack for knowing when to ask the right questions and get answers. She must get that from you."

"Oh, I don't know about that." She wasn't going to let herself be swayed by a too-obvious compliment. "You still haven't answered my last question."

"What question is that?" Amanda asked from the doorway as she entered the room.

 _Thank God_ , Lee breathed a sigh of relief.

Dotty turned to face her daughter. "Oh, I was just asking your gentleman friend about your work...and well..."

"Mother..." Amanda gave her a disapproving look. "Tell me you didn't. You know that I told you when there's something for you to know, you'll know it."

"Well, how am I supposed to really know that? I mean, you're so secretive...as if there's something you know that I don't and that you don't want me to know."

"Is that what you're doing here?"Amanda folded her arms across her chest and glowered at her mother.

"Well, no...of course not, Darling. I was just doing some shopping and got hungry. I knew you worked in the area, so I thought you might like to join me for lunch." She turned back to Lee. "Of course, you're invited too, Mr. Stetson."

"It's Lee, remember?" he said. "Besides, I think we're going to have to work through lunch. Since we spent so much time last week helping you out with _your_ gentleman friend, we're way behind." He gave Amanda a desperate look.

"Of course you are." Dotty responded dryly. "But you do still have to eat, you know."

"We really do have an awful lot of work to catch up on, Mother," Amanda chimed in. "We'll probably, you know, just order some takeout."

Dotty sighed. "Oh, well. Will I at least see you at home for dinner tonight?"

"Of course, Mother. Here, let me walk you out."

Lee finally relaxed once the two West women had left, his muscles on fire from how long he'd been tensing them. He'd been through milder interrogations by the KGB.

Amanda returned a few minutes later with a cheery, "So, where do you wanna go for lunch today?"

"I thought you wanted to order takeout."

Amanda rolled her eyes. "Oh, no, Big Fella, we're going to take a nice long lunch and you're going to tell me everything that just happened in here."

"Everything?" he squeaked nervously.

"Everything," she replied firmly.

"Well, can we at least do it at my place?" He flashed her his most charming smile.

"You're on, but then you have to explain it to my mother if I don't make it home for dinner as I promised."

"So...Randy's?"

"You're on." As she reached for her purse, she added, "Oh, by the way, my mother insists that I not let you get out of coming to Christmas dinner."


End file.
